RETAILERS will face a chaotic festive season unless they do more to help consumers get to grips with new-style credit and debit cards, an IT consultant warned yesterday.

Detica said unless people were more familiar with the new chip and pin cards there were likely to be long queues at tills in the run up to Christmas and the January sales.

The new cards aim to combat fraud by having information stored on a microchip which is more secure than a magnetic strip.

Consumers will also have to verify a purchase by keying in a four-digit pin number rather than signing a receipt.

Around 120 million of the cards are due to be in circulation by the beginning of next year, but research carried out for Detica found that 60% of cardholders still knew nothing about the scheme.

The group found that while 70% of the public were confident the cards would help reduce fraud once they had been explained to them, 56% said they thought there was a risk someone could find out their pin number, while 28% said they would not feel happy entering their pin in a terminal in a shop or restaurant.

From the beginning of next year retailers will be liable for card fraud if they do not meet banks' standards for processing payments using chip and pin cards.

Detica said it had come across evidence of retailers refusing to serve customers who present a chip and pin card but couldn't remember or refused to use their pin. It warned that if one in four consumers refused to use their pin in a shop terminal it could to lead to chaos and long queues.

David Porter, head of fraud and security at Detica, said, "Retailers will have to enforce the new rules. If they don't, they will have to carry the cost of fraud. The key issue is one of education. Banks have been contacting customers about the scheme for some time, but the message does not seem to be getting through.

"We believe the retailers need to do far more to help their customers understand how the way we shop will change."